DeepDotWeb Co-admin Sentenced To 8 Years in Prison (therecord.media) 36
One of the two administrators of the DeepDotWeb portal was sentenced this week to 97 months in prison for receiving money from illegal dark web marketplaces to promote their sites. From a report: Tal Prihar, 37, was detained in May 2019 in France and subsequently extradited to the US. He was charged with running DeepDotWeb, a website on the public internet that advertised and reviewed dark web marketplaces that sold illegal content such as drugs, firearms, and forged documents. US authorities said that Prihar, together with his partner, ran a kickback scheme where they provided links to the marketplaces in exchange for a commission.
Re: Exactly what BizX does. Promotion through astr (Score:2)
Yes, but what BizX is advertising is not illegal, just hot garbage (like SolarWinds, which was literally being heavily advertised here at the same.time they were being dragged for poisoned repos.)
US authorities are just mad because (Score:2)
Re:US authorities are just mad because (Score:4, Insightful)
They're Israelis, this one was living in Brazil - what was the US nexus?
The article says they got a cut of sales, not actually a referral fee, which likely would have made a significant difference on free speech grounds.
But it's not clear why the US had jurisdiction over them. At least legally.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Wouldn't be too hard to establish that a large number of transactions on the marketplace shipped to the US - so the marketplace itself was clearly illegal. All the prosecution would need to show it these guys knew that was the case, participating by sending traffic their direction, then tried to hide their dirty money.
The difference with google is they don't knowingly support illegal sites and don't hide their money trail.
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Here's the relevant sections from the doj:
During the time period relevant to this Indictment, DDW’s referral links were widely used by users in the Western District of Pennsylvania and elsewhere to access and then create accounts on many Darknet marketplaces, including AlphaBay Market, Agora Market, Abraxas Market, Dream Market, Valhalla Market, Hansa Market, TradeRoute Market, Dr. D’s, Wall Street Market, and Tochka Market. When AlphaBay was seized by law enforcement in 2017, it was one of the largest Darknet markets that offered illegal drugs, fraudulent identification materials, counterfeit goods, hacking tools, malware, firearms, and toxic chemicals. Approximately 23.6 percent of all orders completed on AlphaBay were associated with an account created through a DDW referral link, meaning that DDW received a referral fee for 23.6 percent of all orders made on AlphaBay.
Over the course of the conspiracy, the defendants referred hundreds of thousands of users to Darknet marketplaces. These users in turn completed hundreds of millions’ of dollars’ worth of transactions, including purchases of illegal narcotics such as fentanyl, carfentanil, cocaine, heroin, and crystal methamphetamine; firearms, including assault rifles; malicious software and hacking tools; stolen financial information and payment cards and numbers; access device-making equipment; and other illegal contraband. Through the use of the referral links, the defendants received kickbacks worth millions of dollars, generated from the illicit sales conducted on Darknet marketplace accounts created through the site.
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr... [justice.gov]
Re: US authorities are just mad because (Score:2)
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Because America is the largest terrorist state in the world and doesn't give a shit about petty things like "jurisdiction." They just kidnap people, legally or otherwise. The sooner the US is cut down to size and forced not to be quite so uppity, the better it will be for the world as a whole.
More specific answer? The site was likely either partially hosted in the US, a US-owned hosting company was involved, or people in the US bought and sold on the city.
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Sounds like no cost to business to me !
LOL
ok..... (Score:3, Insightful)
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They were charged with money laundering for attempting to disguise the origins of the money - presumably one of the elements of the money laundry charge is that they knew the marketplace was dealing in illegal transactions.
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Maybe so, but... if they're not US citizens then how come they can be arrested in France then extradited to the USA for trial there? How does that work?
Re: ok..... (Score:4, Insightful)
France has an extradition agreement with the USA and is happy to extradite unless the subject is a famous film maker.
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Yes, that part is obvious. It's the "not US citizens" part that worries me.
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If it's illegal in your country and another country, and you commit the crime in another country, then your country will generally extradite. Taking a kickback from an illegal business is illegal pretty much everywhere. If they hadn't been getting paid for their activity they probably would not have been extradited.
Re:ok..... (Score:5, Insightful)
They provided a review of the sites, and direct links to join them, and received a percentage off the sales of narcotics. When you go to "google.com" and watch the page, you do not get promotion for drug dealer websites immediately visible to you, and google does not receive money off the drug sales that you might have found by entering suitable requests on their web index.
Google is like the Tourist Office at the airport. If you know where you want to go, they'll explain you the way, but it's your problem if the place you are asking for is a drug house. DeepDotWeb was like a free leaflet at the airport exit, explicitly reviewing drug houses and giving you instructions on how to get there, and they get a percentage when you show the leaflet when making the deal.
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Don't bother going to that "deepdotweb.com" site: it's only showing a "Domain Seizure" graphic.
Oh, by the way: don't try linking to that graphic either: it has the hugest gobble-de-gook mishmash of binary junk I've ever seen!
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im confused... [false conclusion] ...if i understand correctly.
If you're confused, it helps to not make conclusions, and instead to try to figure it the fuck out.
No, it isn't at all "what google does."
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US Extradites Another Foreigner (Score:5, Interesting)
The thing that always bothers me about these kinds of cases is the fact that the U.S. can extradite foreigners for alleged crimes on foreign soil.
Kim Dotcom is a non-U.S. citizen whose alleged crime (copyright infringement?) happened outside the U.S., but the U.S. was able to extradite him. Julian Assange is a non-U.S. citizen whose alleged crime (passing documents provided by others to news media?) happened outside the U.S., but it looks like the U.S. extradition request will be successful.
There are two possibilities. Either (1) the alleged crime is legal in the country where the person resides, in which case it's shocking that the country would have to hand over the person to some random other country which always seems to be the U.S., or (2) the alleged crime is illegal in the country where the person resides, in which case local prosecutors should be handling the case. Why should the U.S. be able to grab foreigners from foreign countries and put them in U.S. prison??
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The prosecution will have to show US-citizens or people located in the US were involved - the Feds are alleging a substantial number of transactions involved buyers in PA, from which these guys received a cut for referrals.
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So.... why aren't all those buyers in PA on trial? They're the ones committing crimes on US soil, not these guys.
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They were Feds doing a sting from PA. The feds [preview.redd.it] are expert at facilitating [iosconews.com] crimes.
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You're almost there, but it isn't merely that they had contact with Americans, but that they used American banks in the commission of the crime. If you transfer the gains into an American bank, that transfer happened both in the US, and in the country you're in when you did the transfer, and either of these countries may prosecute you if the transfer is illegal at their end.
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Imagine a person in UK who insults the king of Thailand. Thailand demands him extradited. Clearly that extradition should be refused, but is it
1. Because insulting Queen Elizabeth II isn't a crime in the UK, or
2. Because insulting King Vajiralongkorn isn't a crime in the UK?
Really the answer is neither, because even the question reveals that it is a political crime - a crime which only has the government as victim. But the dirty truth is, countries are happy to extradite for political crimes even when their
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Well, not only is there a treaty clause about political crimes in the Thailand-UK extradition treaty, but there's also a list of crimes that extradition is limited to and neither defamation nor lèse-majesté is on that list.
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Way to miss the point. Thailand was just an example.
The real reason such and extradition wouldn't proceed is that it would be bad PR and there would be nothing in it for the UK. If they had wanted to, they would come up with an excuse. Coming up with justification for arbitrary positions is a big part of what they practice in law school.
Thinking a judge wouldn't sink to such corruption is a lot like thinking a priest wouldn't abuse children - not only is it not true, but the fact that people go around belie
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Kim Dotcom is a non-U.S. citizen whose alleged crime (copyright infringement?) happened outside the U.S., but the U.S. was able to extradite him.
No, not yet. Dotcom is still fighting it in the NZ courts. [stuff.co.nz]
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US banks are on US soil. Don't use them for things that are illegal in the US.
It isn't complicated or mysterious, and doesn't have any Illuminati or lizard people.
8 years in prison for advertising (Score:3)
I call that a good start. Now let's find the people calling about car warranties and give them 9 years. They're far worse than any mere drugs or forged documents.
"Kickback scheme" (Score:4)
US authorities said that Prihar, together with his partner, ran a kickback scheme where they provided links to the marketplaces in exchange for a commission.
Illegal substances/weapons aside, why are they making this part seem so sinister. This is a 100% normal thing to do with link-based advertising. Social media influencers fund their gilded lifestyles with this method of advertising.
The MOST important part is this:
Their scheme earned the two approximately 8,155 bitcoins, worth approximately $8.4 million at the time of the transactions, money that was subsequently laundered to disguise its origins.
How about they talk about their laundering techniques?
Bad lawyers, poor PR (Score:1)
The guy didn't have the right legal help — and didn't spin it right. If newspapers can publish illegally-obtained information (such as officially-classified documents [debateus.org]), why is it illegal to advertise illegal services?
For another example, if national BLM figures, who are doing very well [usatoday.com], are neither criminally prosecuted for arson [washingtonpost.com] and other crimes [thecritic.co.uk] committed by BLM-supporters, nor held liable for the damage, why should this guy's activi